Closer to the Chest (18 page)

He groaned, and let his accent slip. “An' a-course, everybody'll hev the same alibi, that they was sound asleep in their own beds. An' if they
weren't,
they sure as hell ain't gonna admit it, even iffen that'd be a alibi thet'd clear 'em.”

“This place is too big, too open,” Amily whispered, in what sounded a little like despair. “And all the freedom we enjoy here only makes it easier for
him
to get away with this!”

“I
ain't
gonna advise we put th' Hill down under guard,” he said flatly. “We do thet, an' all we do's give the damn bully what 'e wants, and 'e wants us afeared, mostly of each other.”

There was a long heavy silence between them.

“Go to sleep,” Amily advised, at last. “Whatever clues there are will still be there in the morning. And at least the Poison Pen has aired his frustration at being balked in the least harmful way possible.”

•   •   •

“I've performed an analysis of your Poison Pen letters,” said Lord Jorthun, as they all lounged in a sort of gazebo on the top of one of the round towers that ornamented his manor. At
three stories up, it caught every bit of blessed breeze, there was plenty of shade from a wide, round, conical roof, and there were reed screens that could be let down to further block the sun. It was probably the coolest spot on the Hill, and Mags and Amily were terribly grateful he'd invited them here. “I didn't bother to bring them; I just brought my notes. So . . .” He consulted a leather-bound notebook of his own. “There are a remarkably
few
number of letters that are direct attacks on specific women—I say remarkably few, because I happen to know of nearly every single illicit affair going on at Court, and believe me, they outnumber the actual letters by a factor of five. These are all nearly identical . . . a lot of vitriol, followed by a lovingly detailed description of the sort of divine retribution that will strike the sort of whore who pursues another woman's husband or betrothed.”

“The divine retribution part is what's interesting, in a sick sort of way,” Amily observed. “Is it specific enough to pinpoint a sect or a religion?”

“Sadly, no.” Jorthun shook his head. “On to the more numerous sort. The majority of these are harangues against women engaging in ‘unwomanly' behavior, mostly daring to take on a ‘man's job' and take the food out of a man's mouth. That covers all of the Trainees, plus a lone Guard here at the Palace, and the scrawls on the walls of the sanctuary. I don't actually have most of those letters, since your Trainees generally pitched them in the fire, but Mags' interviews give me the general numbers.” He tapped his pencil on the page. “Now, of the ones I
do
have, there is a religious tone to them as well.
Women are divinely appointed to be the servants of their men,
is the general gist of the message.”

“Huh.” Mags scratched his chin. “Hadn't noticed that.”

“Neither had your Trainees. But the Prioress certainly did, and so did the female Guard. And unlike the ‘retribution' letters, the ones on the walls and the one sent to the Guard combined equal parts vitriol and obscenity. The theme of the
obscenity seems to have been along the lines of what I would call,
railings against the maneaters.
”

“Then our culprit seems far more likely to be a woman,” said Amily uneasily. “And a particularly insane one at that. With a religious mania and a craving for other peoples' pain.” She shudders. “Ugh.
And
a lot of nasty repressions.”

“Possibly. But I am by no means weighed in that direction myself.” Lord Jorthun consulted his notes. “Either our Poison Pen knows
far
more about the Hill than anyone other than myself,
and
knows quite a bit about at least one part of Haven,
or,
as I suggested before, he is using Farsight.”

“But how would the Poison Pen know where and when t'look?” Mags asked. “Farsight gets kinda specific. I been asking. You either got to know
who
you're lookin' for, or you got to know the
place
where they're at.”

“The Sanctuary of Betane would have presented no problem,” Dia pointed out. “Everyone in that neighborhood knew the Sisters were going to be gone, and when they're
there,
the Sanctuary is wide open for anyone to walk in. So it wouldn't have been hard for someone with Farsight to spy to a certain extent on the Sisters, and to know when it was safe to desecrate the Sanctuary.”

“And the Court?” Amily asked.

“Now . . . that suggests that he's using his Gift on particular people, rather than looking at places,” Jorthun replied. “That would account for the fact that he's only catching a fraction of the bedroom-athletics that I know are going on.”

“Interesting, but I don't see how that helps us,” Amily said at last.

“Not directly, but every bit of information we have will build up a picture of the person we are pursuing. A Gift plus a religious mania suggests to me that this might be someone who was cast out of a religious order for zealotry.” Jorthun raised his eyebrows significantly at Amily. “Contrary to what you might think, most religions do not care for zealots. They
are not comfortable to the rest of the congregants. They demand too much. They don't understand compromise. And they are absolutely,
positively
certain that they and they alone grasp the One Truth—whatever that ‘truth' may be—and everyone else is either ignorant or willfully blind.” He closed his notebook. “It's something I can look for. Nikolas has his people doing the same.”

“Mine ain't gonna be much help,” Mags sighed. “But I've got Teo keepin' his eyes an' ears open.”

“You seem very certain that the Poison Pen is literally watching us, or at least, some of us,” Amily said, as the breeze made a faint whistling sound through the reed screens. “But the letters have stopped having any effect on the Collegia
and
he or she is having trouble getting them to the Trainees now. So . . . now what's going to happen?”

“Ah,” Jorthun replied, looking troubled. “I don't know.”

“Is there any chance she'll give up?” Dia asked her husband, hopefully. “After all, that's how one deters thieves. Nothing is burglar-proof, but you just try to make it so difficult the thieves move on to an easier target.”

Jorthun shook his head. “In my experience, people like this don't follow the rules of rational behavior. They aren't afraid of retribution, because they believe their cloak of righteousness will protect them. So they never back down. They only escalate.”

Mags sighed into the glum silence. “That's what I was afeared you'd say.”

•   •   •

For the first time in days, Mags was getting the reports of his runners in person. It felt
normal,
and normal was something to be cherished, so cherish it he did, finishing the reports off with a general distribution of sausage-stuffed-in-a-bread-roll he'd picked up at a baker on the way. Then he just sat for a
moment, enjoying his happy, healthy young'uns scampering off to their jobs or their schooling. It was good to have something reliably going well.

Then he went next door and took his place at the counter of the pawn-shop, waiting for Teo.

Nothing much had come of the burned effigy; Mags had gone all over it, but there hadn't been anything about it that hadn't been common as grass. The effigy itself was two hay-stuffed tubes of canvas tied in a cross-shape. Where the two tubes intersected, the crosswise one had been tied to form the “breasts,” with the rest of it forming arms. The vertical tube had been tied to make a head and neck, then split to make legs. Mags had halfway expected some pubic horror at the split, but there was nothing there. A crude face with black-rimmed red eyes and a huge red mouth had been painted on the front of the head. What he had taken for yarn was actually light rope sewn to the head with a canvas needle and sailmaker thread. Which might have suggested the maker was a sailor, but Jorthun told him not to put too much emphasis on that. “The same thread and needle are used to sew the mouths of grain-sacks closed,” his mentor advised. Which left him right back where he started. And the fact that the effigy had been
sewn
might have suggested a woman's hand, but the fact was, there were plenty of men who sewed in the course of their jobs.

The “gown” was no help either. Except that it wasn't white, as he'd thought. It was yellow, the yellow of very old linen sheets that had been used hardly, and washed but never bleached. The crude corset-belt was of more canvas, black this time. The “gown” was nothing more than a T-shape sewn of three rectangles of cloth—which could have suggested a man, but the stitches were neat and the neck, wrists, and bottom were hemmed, suggesting a woman.

Unless, of course, the gown had been in use as a sort of bedgown, and the Poison Pen had just bought it on the second-hand market.

They had quite a pile of evidence by this time. The only problem was that it led nowhere.

He had just about given up on seeing Teo, when the bell over the door jangled, and the man himself came in.

Now, there was a reason why Mags had waited to see Teo, and it had nothing to do with the fact that he liked the man—no, he'd been testing Teo, leaking certain things to him to see what came of them, and every single time, Teo had proven himself worthy of trust.

Lord Jorthun and Nikolas had already run their own checks on him, and Teo had emerged clean, or at least, as clean as anyone in his profession could be. There were some items of “excess force” bandied about in certain circles, and it could not be denied that there had been broken bones in Teo's vicinity—but those all dated from the time he'd been employed to keep order in a tavern, and given the clientele of that particular tavern, neither Jorthun nor Nikolas were inclined to hold this against the man.

So, it was time to take the final step.

“'Ello, ye old barstid,” Mags said genially. “Wotcher got fer me?”

Teo's face broke out in a smile. “I was beginnin' t'wonder if the ol' man decided t' give ye a rise.”

“Well,” Mags said, pleased at such an apt opening. “Come back'o shop. There's somethin' to that notion. An' it means a bit of change fer you.”

He unlocked the door that divided the shop itself from the counter and the part where real valuables were kept, and let Teo in. Now the man's scarred face was a mask of curiosity. “Change fer me? Harkon, I ain't quittin' ol' Derrel t' come work this shop! I ain't no good at figgerin', an' Derrel pays me good. I reckon—”

“Ye ain't gonna need t'quit,” Mags interrupted him. “Fust, com git yer grub, cause I want ye inna good mood.”

Mags waved at an upturned keg, the top softened with a
folded rug, and a wooden trencher of bread, cheese, and more of the sausage rolls he'd bought that morning. Nothing loath, Teo tucked into them, as Mags pulled him a beer from another, full keg on one of the shelves full of things people had pawned. He handed Teo the mug, and let Teo eat in silence, until there was a tap on the rear door that was triple-padlocked, and which seldom was opened. He unlocked all three locks, and let the door swing wide.

Amily stood there in her working Whites, Rolan peering over her shoulder from the tiny yard behind her.

Teo gaped, mug halfway to his lips, forgotten.

Then, as if he had suddenly remembered long-forgotten manners, he scrambled to his feet, nearly upsetting the keg he was sitting on. “Milady Herald, m'um,” he stammered, looking at his hands in the next moment, as if trying to figure out what he should do with the mug and cheese he was holding.

“Eh, don't stand on no ceremony, ye ol barstid,” Mags said genially. “This's m'wife, Amily.”

“So I am,” Amily corroborated. She looked about herself. “What an extraordinary collection of things. . . .”

“But you—” spluttered Teo. “But she—”

“Aye, she's Willy th' Weasel's girl. An' Willy's a Herald, too,” Mags continued, grinning at Teo's reaction. “Fer that matter, so'm I.”

Now completely gobsmacked, Teo did the only thing he could do. He sat down heavily. “Kernos' Balls!” he managed, then reddened. “Beggin' yer pardon, milady—”

“I've heard worse. Usually from Mags, although my father once came out with a string of curses the like of which I'd never heard before. I had to look some of them up.” She offered her hand to Teo. “I've heard a lot about you, and I am very happy to finally meet you.”

He took it, gingerly, as if he was afraid he'd break or soil it. Then—because he was a great deal smarter than he looked,
the truth suddenly dawned on him. “Kernos' Balls!” he said again. “I bin workin' fer th' bloody Heralds!”

“Got it in one,” Mags replied, pleased. “An' that's the change I wanted ter talk t'ye about. Ye wanta keep doin' thet?”

“Uh—” Teo looked from Mags to Amily and back again. “Aye?”

“Thought ye'd say thet.” Mags grinned even more broadly. “Well, thet means a rise in yer pay.”

Teo brightened. Then looked bewildered again. “Who knows all this?”

“Auntie Minda, an' the littles. They're
my
gang. Willy gots his own—Jem an' Eller an' Sam an' Luke what works 'ere. Others, too, but tha's the ones ye'd know.” Mags told him.

“My father has his gang of fellows that do what you've been doing—tell him what's going on. Sometimes they look into things for him, and sometimes they help him. The littles can bring Harkon everything they hear, and it's quite a lot, but what they can't do is help him or look into things where only a man-grown can go,” Amily said, in a completely matter-of-fact voice. Mags was very proud of her performance. She was handling this in exactly the right way, saying exactly the right things. “That's why Harkon decided to see if you'd work out. You're the first adult besides Minda he's trusted.”